chrissycat

[luvofallhorses]

How is Taffy?

[manda_moo87]

yeah, how is sweet Taffy boy doing??

[chrissycat21]

Well, I just got him home from my grandparents. (I was there for 6 hours, they were having computer trouble and needed help). He is doing ok. Not as bad as he was last time, now he is atleast eating on his own. He can walk a little, but he looks like he is in pain when he tries. He has taken a few mouthfulls of the banana mush/vitamin C and eaten timothy hay on his own. He's sitting up better, not laying on his side. My grandpa said he perked up once I got there, so I guess he missed me, too.

I hope that he keeps getting better!

[chrissycat21]

Ok, I don't think he had a seizure now, I think he had a heart attack:


If you find an guinea pig very weak on it's legs, or flat out on it's side giving great heaving breaths which come from deep down in the diaphram accompanied by a weak or slow heart beat it has probably had a heart attack.

http://www.oginet.com/pgurney/heartproblems.htm

That almost exactly describes how Taffy has been the past two times when he got sick.

Also, stress leads to heart attacks in people and animals. Well, both times when he started to look sick was immediatly after he had been majorly stressed out.

1) He had been taken to the petstore to be checked for mites/lice because we know the manager and she said she would be able to special order the medicine for us if he had it, so she tried doing the tape test and looking through his fur. After I came home from school we took him to the vet because of the bald patches on his back, he didn't have mites or lice. A cyst that he had for sometime had been bothering him, and when the vet was using the kitty flea comb to comb through his fur and check for bugs she punctured it and it popped. A few days later, Taffy was laying on his side, not moving, not eating, and looking very weak.

2) The second time he was stressed out my dad and I drove him to my grandparents' house so they could petsit for us, he freaked out in the car and I was told that he didn't come out of his pigloo for around 3-4 days after he was there. Then, my mom didn't tell me because she didn't want to worry me, but my grandpa called saying that Taffy wasn't acting right, he wasn't eating, etc. Then my mom realized that it could be the same thing as last time.

Sorry for the long post, but I just realized that it could have been a heart attack. Also, I was reading how it is more likely for them to get heart attacks more then once and they are more likely.

This is why Taffy doesn't go to the vet unless he absolutely has to, way too much stress on him.

I'm glad I was atleast able to figure out what it was, and each time he had been stressed out, and then he got sick.

I wish I realized this earlier! Hopefully he won't get one again.

Edit: I thought I'd let you guys know how Taffy is progressing:

He ate a little today and is drinking more. I changed his cage so now he isn't on litter, he is on towels so I can see if he is going to the bathroom or not. Plus, when he dragged his legs the litter would go, well, up his but (literally) and he already has problems with impaction and 'needs help' going to the bathroom. The only bad part about the towels is:

1)I owe my mom money if they are ruined and can not be used again.

2)His claw got snagged on the towel and it freaked him out.